DREAMING of a mask-free Christmas?
Since last year, the Philippine government has been promising a return to a certain level of normalcy by Christmas this year, that is, not having to wear face masks, at least.
Much of it depends on how many Filipinos have been fully vaccinated to develop herd immunity.
Let’s look at the numbers.
According to the latest numbers from the Philippine Statistics Authority, the Philippines has a projected population of 110,198,654 as of July 1.
As of June 17, 2021, the Philippines has received 14,205,870 vaccine doses.
About 7,563,241 doses have been administered throughout the country, with at least 2,065,134 Filipinos fully vaccinated.
In January, vaccine czar Carlito Galvez Jr. said 161 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines were expected to arrive this year.
Given that most Covid-19 vaccines are administered in two doses, such vaccine supply would be sufficient to inoculate 80.5 million Filipinos.
Galvez has said that the government was aiming to vaccinate 70 million Filipinos this year so the country could achieve herd immunity and have a “better Christmas” in 2021.
Herd immunity happens when a population becomes immune to a disease once a certain threshold number of the people is vaccinated.
Christmas 2021
The country must first achieve herd immunity in “NCR-Plus-8” to protect the rest of the country from future Covid-19 surges, a Dominican priest-scientist said.
The NCR-Plus-8 covers Metro Manila, Metro Cebu, Metro Davao, Bulacan, Batangas, Cavite, Laguna, Pampanga and Rizal
Fr. Nicanor Austriaco, O.P., a molecular biologist and visiting professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, said that this “exit strategy” would prevent the virus from spreading to other provinces in the country, and lead to a mask-free Christmas.
“[W]hen we build herd immunity in the NCR-Plus-8, we will protect the rest of the country because surges always begin in the NCR,” Austriaco said during a Palace briefing last June 17.
But herd immunity doesn’t merely mean vaccinating 70 percent of the population, said Austriaco, who is also part of the OCTA Research Group.
He stressed that vaccinating 70 percent of each level of society—households, offices, LGUs—is crucial to building the country’s protection against Covid-19.
The country must also ramp up its daily vaccination rate to 250,000 doses to achieve herd containment by October and herd immunity the following November—in time for a “no-mask Christmas.”
“This is a realistic and attainable goal for all of us,” Austriaco said. “Can we have a no-mask Christmas? What would it look like? It would look like what it was before. This is possible, Israel showed, once you attain containment.”
With the current vaccination rate of the Philippines, it will take about 2.1 years or until July 2023 to fully vaccinate 70 million Filipinos and achieve herd immunity, according to independent vaccination tracker herdimmunity.ph, K.A.L. Escarilla
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